Google’s new behavioral ads already raising privacy worries

Google's newest advertising strategy, behavioral targeting, has finally arrived. The strategy, referred to as "interest-based" advertising, will go beyond current targeted advertising practices and track your Internet usage habits in order to serve an ad that the search giant hopes is better suited for you. This means that, instead of visiting a music site and simply getting music-related ads, you might visit a music site and getting ads for the newest "Cats Meowing Christmas Carols" album—because Google knows you spend 95 percent of your Internet time at Catster.

The company announced today that it's launching a beta test of the interest-based system today on its partner sites and YouTube, eventually allowing other advertisers to join the program in April. Advertisers have long been asking for a way to behaviorally target ads, the company said, but Google also says that it will benefit end-users by showing them ads they're genuinely interested in. "We believe there is real value to seeing ads about the things that interest you," Google's VP of Product Management Susan Wojcicki wrote on the Official Google Blog.

For those who want to control how the interest-based ads are targeting them, Google has added options to its preference pane that let users view how they've been categorized so far. From there, users can add other interest categories or even delete the ones that have already been added. Currently, ad categories range from animals to computers & electronics to food & drink, and everything in between. Each category can be split out into various subcategories as well, so users can get as granular as they would like in terms of what kinds of ads they want to see.

The key issue that Google will undoubtedly deal with for years to come will be—of course—privacy. Needless to say, Google's announcement has the alarms going off with privacy advocates, and some users are already uneasy with the idea. Google is attempting to allay those fears by letting users opt out of the new advertising model, and has even designed a browser plug-in that maintains the opt-out choice (in case you're the compulsive cookie-clearing type).

Google is careful to note that the new system doesn't attach any identifying information to the cookie, though the mere fact that it exists is already too much for some critics. "Google might well hype their targeting system as a boon to pet owners, but the reality is that the service will track just about everything you do and everything you're interested in, no matter how personal or sensitive," Privacy International head Simon Davies told the BBC. He and others believe that the system should off by default and allow users to opt-in if they choose, but Google insists that it believes opt-out is the way to go.

Google isn't the first search/advertising company that has implemented behavioral techniques, but it's most certainly the largest. Microsoft launched its own behavioral advertising system in the US in 2006, and went global at the end of that year. As for whether these methods should be regulated, the Federal Trade Commission said in a report issued last month that companies that use behavioral advertising should notify customers about the information collected and allow them to opt out without burying the information in a lengthy privacy policy, things that Google appears to be doing thus far. Still, the FTC believes the industry should be self-policing for the time being, though the door is still open for investigations on current initiatives.

I'm going to be going the "blocking all Google cookies route". I'm afraid its not that simple for me since I'm currently using Google Apps. It means I have to migrate email and all sorts of headaches. I've been using Gmail since 2005 which probably makes it a record. But, like all good things, I seems the days of trusting Google are coming to an end.

Hrmph, I've been contemplating dropping Gmail and some of Google's other useful services for a bit now as Big Brother continues to encroach on my privacy and Google gets closer to tyrannical governments and Federal agencies. This has solidified it. I'm going to have to migrate to a new e-mail.

Hrmph, I've been contemplating dropping Gmail and some of Google's other useful services for a bit now as Big Brother continues to encroach on my privacy and Google gets closer to tyrannical governments and Federal agencies. This has solidified it. I'm going to have to migrate to a new e-mail.

This is absurd. This article is very unbiased about the issue, but some commenters clearly don't get the picture. There aren't little men running around in your computer watching what you do all the time. Google's employees don't sit there laughing at you for looking for pictures of butterflies and reading poems; it is entirely anonymous. The biggest misconception by far, however, is that the government ("Big Brother") is "watching" what you are doing. Let me say something that should already be perfectly obvious: Google doesn't hand over the information to the government and the government has no means to access it. On top of all that, it shouldn't even matter for most people if the government actually had recording devices installed on your computers because you probably don't have anything to hide. They can prove nothing from your searches or the pages you visit, unless you actually do illegal activities (and I'm not talking about P2P here -- they can't prove anything with search for that).Stop worrying so much about something that will make ads more relevant to you and start doing something worthwhile. Stopping using Gmail won't ever change anything except make your email service slower and with less storage and features. This really shouldn't be an issue -- you can opt out!

Originally posted by Rekrul:Why do you need a permanent opt-out plugin if you regularly clear cookies? I know the setting will be cleared (if you set it) when the cookies are deleted, but so will any tracking information.

If you reject all Google cookies, it can't track you at all, right?

If only.

No, Google's perfectly aware that there are users who regularly clear cookies. They work on technologies that attempt to maintain tracking state in-between that, though - for example, a really (*really*) basic tactic would be to track IP addresses. I'm sure they've got significantly better methods than that, of course.

And, naturally, that does nothing to help users who actually want to use the Google applications (which requires logging in). So the plugin is definitely one step.

Me? I opt to use a Google anonymizer. I've been pondering moving away from using Google, and this is another good reason why....

quote:

Originally posted by Californian:This is absurd. This article is very unbiased about the issue, but some commenters clearly don't get the picture. There aren't little men running around in your computer watching what you do all the time. Google's employees don't sit there laughing at you for looking for pictures of butterflies and reading poems; it is entirely anonymous. The biggest misconception by far, however, is that the government ("Big Brother") is "watching" what you are doing. Let me say something that should already be perfectly obvious: Google doesn't hand over the information to the government and the government has no means to access it. On top of all that, it shouldn't even matter for most people if the government actually had recording devices installed on your computers because you probably don't have anything to hide. They can prove nothing from your searches or the pages you visit, unless you actually do illegal activities (and I'm not talking about P2P here -- they can't prove anything with search for that).Stop worrying so much about something that will make ads more relevant to you and start doing something worthwhile. Stopping using Gmail won't ever change anything except make your email service slower and with less storage and features. This really shouldn't be an issue -- you can opt out!

... I'm sorry? Just for knee-jerk reactions, first off, Big Brother needn't apply to just the government - it's been used to refer to oppressive corporate entities, particularly in science fiction, for a while now (yay cyberpunk!).

And, I'm rather tired of the "if you have nothing to hide" argument. Privacy is privacy. I recognize that some loss of privacy is necessary to operate in a society, but just because I have nothing to hide doesn't mean that (to take your statement to an extreme) I don't have a problem with the government keeping tabs on all of my financial accounts, going through my home with a fine-tooth comb every other day, or embedding me with a GPS tracking device. Straw man response? Perhaps. But it's about as straw man as the "if you have nothing to hide" argument....

Except for subpoenas and government sponsored wiretaps? Just having the data in the first place makes them a target for government fishing expeditions. To date, I am aware of at least one attempt, which to Google's credit was foiled. Will the next one? And the one after that? What about the one performed under the guise of national security arbitrated in a secret court?

@androticus: I agree for the most part. I'd rather not get ads for all the various products that have nothing pertaining to me. I do worry though about the privacy aspect.

There are other aspects to the privacy problem that could be problematic. Think about the myriad ways that getting targeted ads for products that you might not want others knowing you've looked for. Say you did research on a medical problem you or someone you may know has. You might not want ads popping up for miracle cures for that problem.

Or say you are shopping for an engagement ring for your girlfriend. You might not want ads popping up about engagement rings on a computer you share with her. I'm sure everyone has various examples of things you might not want being tracked and products suggested for those things later on.

The problem with behavioural targeting is that it's very high up on the cost-benefit curve.

If I'm looking at a hardware site, you don't need a personal behavioural profile to figure "Special offer on Phenom II" is likely to convert well.

If you build a huge profile, you might be able to say "I'm more likely to respond to a Phenom II ad than a Core i7 ad". But the database size necessary to build even a handful of meaningful correlations would be quite large, especially when it's necessary to seperate signal from noise.

The big issue is all in the numbers:

* How much higher a conversion rate will personal targeting get?* How much more will the personally-targeted ads cost to advertisers?* Will the revenue brought in selling personally targeted ads justify the costs of managing the underlying profiles?

The first two are the biggie-- will advertisers pay twice as much for a 20% higher conversion rate?

If you don't want your searches to be "recorded and tracked" by Google, don't use their search engine. When you submit a search you send information to their servers, at which point they technically can do whatever they want with it, since there's not customer-google confidentiality agreement. Would you have a problem if your librarian were to recommend a book to you because she remembers what other books you borrowed?

As for gmail, well, if you use outlook for example, your email is stored on your computer and can be accessed by the authorities with a proper warrant. Which is also the only way said authorities can access your gmail stored emails on google's servers.

THe only issue I see here, is that in both examples above, there's a difference between individual cases, and the fact that with google it all can be done on a massive scale.However, as long as google is simply using the information to provide me with ads that I might be more interested in, I don't see a problem here.

Now, if they send note to my car insurance company informing them that I may have had an accident because I did a search for "how to repair bumper" - then yeah I'm not using google anymore.

i can't believe people are surprised about this. didn't google buy doubleclick? isn't this doubleclick's motus operandi? the only thing that surprises me is how long it took google to try to sneak this up all our collective rectums.we are not individuals. we are a massive commodity to be tracked, profiled, categorized, and exploited. we are sheep to be fed what the corporate masters deem relevant. we are to be seduced by so called free services so that third parties will pay to get to us. we must obey. we must not resist. resistance is futile. thou shalt be served what is relevant whether we want it or not.

Google doesn't hand over the information to the government and the government has no means to access it. On top of all that, it shouldn't even matter for most people if the government actually had recording devices installed on your computers because you probably don't have anything to hide.

No, Google doesn't "hand over" information to the government - theyare the government.

And what if the government is not only looking out for illegalities, but for what they think should be illegal - libertarianism, or Islam - nobody knows what they will decide to watch for.

Does this go by Google ID or cookies left on a computer? If it goes by ID, this could alienate quite a few a customers. Say you do work related searches at work and porn at home, will porn ads pop up at work? People behave differently in different settings.

What if you married and you frequent a dating site, then your significant other hops your computer?

mdb002, what you and others have been forgetting here is that there is an ability to tailor which "areas of interest" the tracker will generate ads for. So if you do use your account to search for porn, you turn the freaking porn settings off on which ads to show. Same with buying an engagement ring for your girlfriend or browsing dating sites.

Quite simply, if you're expecting Google to think for you as well as generate interest-targeted ads, then you've got more serious issues than a simple getting caught after the fact problem.

Good lord.

While I'm not a fan of opt-out instead of opt-in, I still don't see what the "Big Brother" crap is about. They're being transparent about the whole issue so far as we know, so what's the deal? If they abuse it, we'll be able to see and lay the smack down on them.

Cherlindrea You are a teenager, turning off these settings will make your parents suspicious, do you use Google or another search engine. Every teen in this will be using other search engines. Also the default is on, will everyone know google is doing this, no. How many will find out the hard way.

I think Google is taking a terrible risk in alienating many users, and pushing future users away with this.

Nothing to do with big brother, you can always use another search engine, I think google will find that out. This was poorly thought out.

Google is way too large and powerful that I don't think they will be forcing anyone away with this. It is only a matter of time before the majority of ads on the internet are interest based. It is just simply the next step. Facebook has been trying to do it for quite some time now. Google has taken a lot of precautionary steps to make sure this goes over pretty well. If people really have that big of a problem with it then they can opt-out of it and all is well again. This is just going to create more advertising revenue for Google and other sites and companies that start doing interest based ads. This advertising revenue can then be used to benefit us, the users, with site improvements. Here is a video with some more details about Google's move:

How about this - block all of google's cookies with AdBlock and always use --- ixquick.com --- for searching.

In June 2006 we started to delete our users' privacy data within 48 hrs. As of January 2009 we do not even record our users' IP addresses at all anymore. We are the first and only search engine to do so. Our initiative is receiving an overwhelmingly positive response!

I get an uneasy feeling somehow when I hear that someone is tracking my interests online. Supposed to be for my benefit by serving me with the search results that suit my profile best. But this kind of thing is so easily open to abuse. That uneasy feeling tells me that I will opt out of this and I rather think that a lot of others will to.http://www.bestregistryrepaironline.com